Making Black Gold

Now here's something you don't get to do every day:  tour a city's composting operation.

I was at a meeting this afternoon with the Jackson Area Outdoor Coalition, and after the meeting, we all convoyed over to the city's composting project, which is operated by one of the Coalition's members.

This operation has been going for only a few short years (four?).  Every fall they collect all the leaves raked from the lawns of Jackson's citizenry.  The city park caretakers also bring in trees that are removed from parks, streets, etc.  All of this is composted at this one operation, creating some really nice compost/mulch.

So, here' the tour.  This pile is the Stump Pile, composed of chopped up stumps that are removed from the ground when trees are taken down.

The next pile is wood chips, the remains of many trees and branches that have been ground up into small bits.  This is good for mulching gardens, but it is also added to the soil mixture they make (more on this in a moment).

Here we have the newest pile of leaves, complete with leaf bags, collected this last fall.

The leaves are piled into long rows, called windrows.  Here they sit and bake.  As they say, "compost happens," and here we see it in action.  All one has to do to make compost is collect organic matter, put it in a pile, and let it cook.  It will naturally heat up  - all a part of the process of decay.

For the unbelievers in the group, Tom brought along a thermometer to read the internal temp of the leaf piles.

Within a minute, on this 19*F day, the thermometer soared to over 120 degrees.  When the piles reach 130-140*F, they are at about the hottest they will get.  At this temp all seeds are killed (no quackgrass to sprout from this compost), and many impurities are also negated.  It is now that the piles need to be turned over.

And here we see it in action.  The piles get turned over once a month (we had good timing).  Look at that steam rising!

Scoop and drop!

Ssssssss!

Tom grabbed a handful and we all felt it.  It was pleasantly warm, and surprisingly dry!  They like it when there is new snow when they turn the piles, because this adds much-needed moisture to the compost.  This helps the decaying process proceed a bit faster, and helps bake things well.

In about 15 months, a mountain of black gold is produced.  Here in Jackson, this compost is available to the public at a VERY reasonable rate.  If you live in the city, you can get one cubic yard free.  After that, it is $10 per cubic yard.  If you want it delivered, there is also a delivery fee.  If you live outside the city, but within Jackson County, you can still get the compost, but you don't get any free.  Starting some time in April, once things warm up, you can drive up on a Friday and collect compost to take home with you.  Don't wait, though, for by June it is usually all gone!

They also set some aside and mix it with the wood chips and some topsoil, creating really good soil for planting.  This mixture is used to fill in where stumps are removed when trees are taken down.  See - the whole process is recycling at its finest!

Concerned about contaminants?  Tom says they screen the mulch/compost several times, removing plastic, car parts, cans, etc.  He also told us how this compost has been proven to ameliorate contaminated soils.  Consumer's Energy has built a new building in the city on a site that was VERY contaminated with all sorts of bad chemicals (I heard them say something about chromium).  About twelve inches of this compost was added to the site, probably as part of the landscaping and as filler.  Tests now show that many of the contaminants are gone - or at least exist now in greatly reduced concentrations.  The city has even gotten calls complaining about the number of earthworms on the sidewalks after a rain - if there are worms living in those toxic soils now, they must be greatly improved.

So, I know that where ever I finally end up with a home, I will making a call to get a truck load of this black gold delivered to my land so I can work it into my soil for my veg gardens of the future.

Squirrel Appreciation Day

Like me, you might have missed it.  I saw a notice from a friend back in Newcomb (thanks, Charlotte) that Friday, 21 January, was Squirrel Appreciation Day!

Now, I know, a lot of folks really don't like these fluffy-tailed rascals, but I think they are kinda cute...and amusing.  And they come in so many varieties.  Back in Newcomb, we had red squirrels, the occasional grey squirrel (and even a black morph or two), and flying squirrels (seldom seen).  Oh, and eastern chipmunks.

Here in Michigan, I've added the fox squirrel to my life list, as previously mentioned.  But we also have thirteen-lined ground squirrels (I really can't wait to see one of them!) and least chipmunks (who knew that chippies came in two flavors!).

They may raid our feeders, greatly increasing our feeding costs.  However, the optimist will look at them this way instead of as thieves:  they encourage us to use our brains and ingenuity to come up with ever new and creative ways to foil them!  In other words, they are helping improve our cognitive development!

However you feel about squirrels, you should read Outwitting Squirrels - a  light-hearted approach to living with squirrels in your back yard.

As for me, I think I will toss a few extra seeds outside on the ground this morning, just to let them know that I, for one, kinda like 'em.

Frazil Ice

My friend Evelyn, who is an extraordinary naturalist, is the Queen of Frazil Ice.  Evelyn lives in North Creek, hard by the Hudson River in the central Adirondack Mountains of New York.  For many years she has watched and studied the phenomenon known a frazil ice, and on more than one occasion she has explained it to me, but I never quite got a handle on it, until today.

Today Evelyn sent me a link to a wonderful YouTube video from Yosemite National Park that explains this seasonal event nicely - with some great footage.  You can see that video here.

Here is what Evelyn once wrote to me about frazil ice:

Frazil ice first forms as tiny round crystals*after nucleating in some way that has long been a puzzle to scientists*throughout the river in cold weather. Turbulent super-cooled (slightly below 32*F) water tumbles the crystals around making them grow until they float at the surface in loose agglomerations. It looks like floating snow. If frazil touches something underwater, a deadfall or a rock, it sticks. It builds from the sides and from the middle of the river and can eventually form dams, such is the case at the Ice Meadows where the ice can grow to near glacial proportions. Cobbles and gravels at the bottom can be popped to the surface when the ice becomes buoyant enough. This process adds to the other river dynamics that are constantly moving sand, silt, gravel, and cobbles along the riverbed.

I don't know if Michigan gets any frazil ice...perhaps in the UP.  It's worth finding some if you've never seen it.

The Dry Marsh Trail at Waterloo

A busy day is on the docket today. My schedule had a house viewing in the morning, after which I thought the dog and I would take in another nature trail in the Waterloo Recreation Area. After returning home, I would have a couple hours to relax and take care of the animals before going in to work for an owl program. I am signed on to lead one of the trail walks after the indoor portion, during which we plan to try and call in some owls.

Like I said, a busy day.

So, at 9:00 I loaded Toby in the car and off we drove toward the Waterloo Recreation Area, which was also where the house I wanted to see was located. A small house, on almost three acres, but located in an area surrounded by preserved land, including a preserved grassland just down the road.

As we left the viewing, I saw something one just doesn't see every day - a Hunting Club out for a morning jaunt.

Not a hundred percent sure where I was going from there, we took the scenic route (not quite getting lost), ending up in Munith before turning around and backtracking.  Finally, I found the entrance into the park and located the trailhead for the Dry Marsh Trail.

I love wetlands, so I was interested in seeing what this had to offer.  It is only a half-mile loop, but I had great expectations.

I rigged Toby up on his ski-joring harness, much more comfortable for him than his usual collar and leash set up, and much easier on me, since the rig attaches to a hip belt that I am wearing.  Frees up the hands, don'tcha know.

We saw an enterprising soul camping!  Winter camping...not for the faint of heart.

So, here we are, at the beginning of the trail.  It looked like only one or two others had been this way, but not too recently.

In short order, we came to what was apparently the "dry marsh".  It looked to me like an ice-covered pond.

Although the previous walkers had forged out across the wetland, I opted to stick to the trail.  We weren't alone, for a deer had passed this way only moments before we arrived.  I'd like to claim that my prodigious tracking skills are of such monumental quality that I can determine time of passage from the tracks, but sadly, my skills are not of that caliber.  I knew the deer had recently been here because I saw its retreating hindquarters flashing through the trees ahead of us.

Tangled vines lined the trail in great quantity.  I was intrigued, until I discovered...

...it was Asian bittersweet...again.

And here is an example of why this vine is problematic.  Look at how it has wound around this young sapling.  As it grows, it will strangle the tree, eventually killing it.

The trail looped around the end of the pond, um, marsh, and climbed up a steepish hill.  Now walking along a bit of a ridge, we had a nice view of the wetland below.  I imagine in the spring or autumn that this is a rather lovely little trail.

The only other thing of note we encountered was this tree.  Looks like it is rather popular with some of the local woodpeckers.  Around here, there are several species of woodpeckers (and their kin).  Downy and hairy woodpeckers are common, but we can also add flickers, red-bellieds and pileateds.  As noted in a previous post, there are red-headed woodpeckers in the region, too.  The black-backed and three-toed, however, remain further north, where the habitat tends toward boreal forest.

In all too short a time, we found ourselves back at the trail head.  This had to be the shortest half-mile I've every walked!

Readdressing Same

I feel I must make further comment with regard to yesterday's post.

Here are a couple things we must keep in mind when we suddenly discover some benefits to invasive species.

1.  These data reflect the highly seasonal dietary needs of just three species of migratory birds.  What about the other migrants?  What about the birds that stay year round?  And what are these same three species eating during the spring migration when said fruits are not available?

2.  We have to look at the BIG picture.  For example, do these invasive plants have any other benefits, or are they highly selective?  Further example: are there any local insects that benefit from the presence of these plants, and on the flip side, are there insects that are negatively impacted by same?  What most of us fail to realize is that insects are vital links in most ecosystems, and many insects are dependent on plants (sometimes a single plant) as hosts at some point in their life cycle (food for adult, food for larva, shelter for adult, shelter for larva, shelter for egg, protection from predators via chemical compounds ingested....etc.).  Here is a terrific example of this whole point, about which I only learned this last year:  there is a particular butterfly (the mustard white, Pieris oleracea) whose larva has limited host plants, all in the native crucifera family (mustards).  These plants are becoming quite scarce, thanks to the incursions of that Top Ten Invasive Plant known as garlic mustard.  The larvae do not thrive on garlic mustard - it doesn't supply the nutrients they need for optimal growth. For a quick summary of this butterfly's status in Massachusetts, go here.

3.  What were these three species of birds eating a hundred years ago, two hundred years ago, thousands of years ago, before these non-native plants arrived on the scene?  There had to be suitable fruits around, otherwise the birds would've died off long ago from starvation.  So, if these non-natives were once more removed from the landscape (admittedly highly unlikely), would the birds find something else to eat, like the pokeweed fruits, which also featured high on the list?  Would they also turn to the dogwood fruits, and wild grapes?  Would they something else to snack upon that was high in sugar but low in lipids?

4.  What are the negative costs to the ecosystem created by these plants?  Do they out-weigh the benefits?

I'm sure that field biologists and researchers can probably come up with a much longer list, but I think this gets the point across.  Yes, it is very interesting that the birds actually do exhibit a benefit to having these invasive plants on hand, but that doesn't mean that we should let invasive honeysuckles, buckthorns, et al, run rampant and unchecked over the landscape to the expense of everything else.

Something to think about.

When Non-native Plants Turn Good

Who would've thunk it?  First, that a program about thrushes would turn out to have some very interesting information on plants, and secondly, that highly invasive non-native plants might turn out to be beneficial.

Tonight I attended a program sponsored by Jackson Audubon.  The speaker was Julie Craves, a researcher at the Rouge River Bird Observatory (RRBO), which is located in Dearborn, MI, which is near Detroit.  The topic was "Birds and Berries," and it was about her nearly twenty years of research on the importance of urban spaces in the stop-over ecology of birds during the fall migration.

A weighty topic that could literally encompass tens of species of birds (her nets caught 111 species, but not all of those were migratory), Julie chose to focus on three species:  grey-cheeked thrushes, Swainson's thrushes, and hermit thrushes.

To sum up ever so briefly her many years of research, here is what she did and what she has discovered.

During the fall, she and some students set up mist nests in a 300 acre spot of green space there in the heart of a highly developed urban environment.  Birds are captured daily during the designated research period.  Once free from the mist nets, the birds are placed in cotton bags and hung quietly to await their turns for "processing."  Processing involves determining how much fat is on the birds, assessing visual evidence of diet (e.g., purple-stained feathers around the vent indicated a diet of purple berries, such as wild grapes), and banding each specimen that is to be included in the study.  If the birds cooperatively leave a stool sample behind in the bags, all the better, for each sample is taken to a lab and dissected.  Why?  Because when birds eat the fruits available to them in the autumn landscape, most of the consumed seeds pass right through their digestive tracts.  The seeds are separated from the guano, identified (apparently easily done), and counted.

What Julie expected to find out was just which native plants were vital to the birds' diets.  What she actually found out, much to her surprise, was how important the non-native plants are, primarily Amur honeysuckle, common buckthorn and glossy buckthorn.

Anyone who has even a passing interest in invasive species knows that these are three of the top invasives that are threatening American ecosystems.  Here we are (we being biologists, ecologists, nature enthusiasts, et al), trying to eradicate, or at the very least control, these species, and suddenly we learn that they are important for the birds.

The big question is:  why are these non-native plants preferred in these birds' diets over the fruits of the native plants, plants that evolved along with the birds for millenia?

Here are some of the current thoughts.  Many of the native fruits are high in fats (lipids), which, while high energy foods, also require more energy to process.  The non-native plants, on the other hand, are producing high-sugar fruits.  Sugar is readily used by the birds' bodies, providing a quicker source of energy.  They also pass through the birds' systems pretty quickly, allowing them to eat even more.

When the birds stop-over somewhere while on migration, the purpose is mostly to refuel.  They have to consume approximately 4% of their body weight in food every day, often putting on 4-6 grams before they take off again. 

For years, the common "wisdom" was that the non-native fruits had little nutritional value for birds.  The fruits passed through the birds' systems pretty darn fast.  Now it seems that this is all part of the strategy to store quick energy.

So, what is the take-home message here?  Should we all go out and preserve stands of invasive plants?  Not necessarily.  What we need to do, however, is start to consider the value of these plants in the changing landscape.  A new ecosystem is developing in the wake of this vegetative invasion, and it seems that at least some animals have adapted to the change, making the most of what these plants have to offer.

Bottom line:  we still have a lot to learn about this world in which we live.  Food for thought.

A Perfect Winter Morning

We begin today's adventure with a glance out the kitchen window. Lo! and behold! it is one of the rogue neighborhood cats. Hey! You!

Yes, I'm talkin' to you! Where do you live and why do you skulk around my house? Are you eating the birds at my feeder?


Some quick detective work has turned up the hide-away. I thought things were suspicious with that board cocked at an angle. I nudged it back into place the other night, only to find the next morning it was back in this position. Hm. Seems to me that this is where the cats (there are two that I know of - the little tiger above and an orange and white fellow) are sheltering. Could this be a source of the fleas?


Anyway, it is a glorious winter day here in southern Michigan. I got up late (after all, the sun doesn't really start to get up until well after 8 AM, so why should I?) and the sun was shining for all it was worth in a blue blue sky. I decided the dog and I needed to check out some nature trails.


We headed over to Ella Sharp Park, which is only a couple miles away. I drove around until I found what looked like a trail going into the woods. This would be our destination.

Even though it was already about 11:30, the trees and plants were coated with thick crystals of ice - hoar frost.


We found some Asian bittersweet along the trail once we left the field and entered the woods. This vine seems to be ubiquitous here. In just three weeks I've already seen it more often than I have the rest of my life!

We mosied into another field. There were times where the trail under our feet was snow on ice, so I suspect this might be one of the area's many pocket wetlands.

Even the tops of the trees were still frosty. Back in the Adirondacks, this frost would have burned off by this time of day. It looks like Michigan is the perfect place for us late sleepers!


Even more common than the bittersweet is the honeysuckle. Much of the trail passed through arched bowers of the stuff. It's lovely, yes, but so invasive...as noted by the sheer numbers of plants here.


So many of the trees have lovely silhouettes. I attended a meeting of the local photography club this week. One of the things they do is assign certain topics for photographs to be viewed and judged at the next meeting. Silhouettes are on the list for the meeting in two weeks. So, I thought I'd give it a try since the sun was so cooperative this morning. However, I think the sun was just a little too bright...it was difficult to get any really good shots (but not for lack of trying).

I really like this one, though.

We've had some strong winds lately, which blew the snow from the last day or two into some interesting patterns along the sides of trees.


I've been told that the Grand River flows through Ella Sharp Park. Could this be it?


Toby's trying to form his own opinion.


About an hour later we arrived back at the car. How bare it seems without a license plate on the front - Michigan only does plates on the back.

This afternoon I am off to "work" to attend a program on Winter Bird ID by one of our staff naturalists. While my birding skills are probably better than those of the average Joe, I find myself stumped by most sparrows and other LBJs - little brown jobbers. Sputzies, as my dad calls them. I hope to pick up a few good tips.